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On measuring economic growth from outer space: a single country approach

Author

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  • Víctor M. Guerrero

    (Instituto Tecnológico Autónomo de México (ITAM))

  • Juan A. Mendoza

    (University of Chicago)

Abstract

This article proposes a simple statistical approach to combine nighttime light data with official national income growth figures. The suggested procedure arises from a signal-plus-noise model for official growth along with a constant elasticity relation between observed night lights and income. The methodology implemented in this paper differs from the approach based on panel data for several countries at once that uses World Bank ratings of income data quality for the countries under study to produce an estimate of true economic growth. The new approach: (a) leads to a relatively simple and robust statistical method based only on time series data pertaining to the country under study and (b) does not require the use of quality ratings of official income statistics. For illustrative purposes, some empirical applications are made for Mexico, China and Chile. The results show that during the period of study there was underestimation of economic growth for both Mexico and Chile, while official figures of China over-estimated true economic growth.

Suggested Citation

  • Víctor M. Guerrero & Juan A. Mendoza, 2019. "On measuring economic growth from outer space: a single country approach," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 57(3), pages 971-990, September.
  • Handle: RePEc:spr:empeco:v:57:y:2019:i:3:d:10.1007_s00181-018-1464-1
    DOI: 10.1007/s00181-018-1464-1
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    Cited by:

    1. Francisco Corona & Elio Atenógenes Villaseñor & Jesús López-Pérez & Ranyart R. Suárez, 2023. "Estimating Mexican municipal-level economic activity indicators using nighttime lights," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 65(3), pages 1197-1214, September.
    2. Rangel González Erick & Llamosas-Rosas Irving, 2021. "Observing the Evolution of the Informal Sector from Space: A Municipal Approach 2013-2020," Working Papers 2021-18, Banco de México.
    3. Jiandong Chen & Ming Gao & Shulei Cheng & Yiyin Xu & Malin Song & Yu Liu & Wenxuan Hou & Shuhong Wang, 2022. "Evaluation and drivers of global low-carbon economies based on satellite data," Palgrave Communications, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 9(1), pages 1-12, December.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Digital number; Generalized least squares; Median; Night lights; Tchebysheff’s theorem;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C2 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Single Equation Models; Single Variables
    • C4 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric and Statistical Methods: Special Topics
    • O4 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Growth and Aggregate Productivity

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